Al-Qaeda militants among victims; U.S. working on rules for targeted-killing operations

SANAA, Yemen 
Yemeni military officials say eight people have been killed in two suspected U.S. drone strikes in Abieda valley in central Marib province.

Residents contacted by The Associated Press say at least two of the eight people killed in Saturday night’s strikes were known al-Qaeda militants of Saudi nationality.

They identified one as Ismail bin Jamil.

They say at least three of the bodies were charred beyond recognition.

Security officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak to media. Residents spoke anonymously for fear of reprisal.

The United States has carried out dozens of suspected drone attacks against al-Qaeda in Yemen, which Washington considers the group’s most active branch.

The nation on the tip of the Arabian Peninsula is among the poorest in the region.

Meanwhile, the Obama administration is nearing completion of a detailed counterterrorism manual designed to establish clear rules for targeted-killing operations but leaves open a major exemption for the CIA’s campaign of drone strikes in Pakistan, U.S. officials said.

The carve-out would allow the CIA to continue pounding al-Qaeda and Taliban targets for a year or more before the agency is forced to comply with more stringent rules spelled out in a classified document that officials have described as a counterterrorism “playbook.”

The document, expected to be submitted to President Barack Obama for final approval within weeks, marks the culmination of a yearlong effort by the White House to codify its counterterrorism policies and create a guide for lethal operations through Obama’s second term.

A senior U.S. official involved in drafting the document said that a few issues remain unresolved but described them as minor. The senior U.S. official said the playbook “will be done shortly.”

The adoption of a formal guide to targeted killing marks a significant — and to some uncomfortable — milestone: The institutionalization of a practice that would have seemed anathema to many before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Among the subjects covered in the playbook are the process for adding names to kill lists, the legal principles that govern when U.S. citizens can be targeted overseas and the sequence of approvals required when the CIA or U.S. military conduct drone strikes outside war zones.

U.S. officials said the effort to draft the playbook was nearly derailed late last year by disagreements between the State Department, the CIA and the Pentagon on the criteria for lethal strikes and other issues.

Granting the CIA a temporary exemption for its Pakistan operations was described as a compromise that allowed officials to move forward with other parts of the playbook.

The decision to allow the CIA strikes to continue was driven in part by concern that the window for weakening al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan is beginning to close, with plans to pull most U.S. troops out of neighboring Afghanistan over the next two years. CIA drones are flown out of bases in Afghanistan.